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Nader: Game Makers Are Just "Electronic Child Molesters"

Political activist and former presidential candidate Ralph Nader has taken it upon himself to lambaste the video game industry, calling game creators and publishers "electronic child molesters." ...yeah.

In speaking to Politico, Nader said President Barack Obama's new plan to reduce gun violence in the US doesn't do enough in terms of regulation and restriction, and that includes regulating game developers. Said Nader:

"We are in the peak of [violence in entertainment]. Television program violence? Unbelievable. Video game violence? Unprecedented. I’m not saying he wants to censor this, I think he should sensitize people that they should protect their children family by family from these kinds of electronic child molesters."

Obama has implemented a $500 million, 23-point plan that tasks the Centers for Disease Control to conduct more studies concerning the relationship between virtual violence and real-world violence. This is only part of a long string of political uprisings against gaming since the Newtown school shooting tragedy, which left twenty children and six adults dead. But hey, the good news here is that we don't need to rebut. "Electronic child molesters" speaks for itself. Have fun dealing with that backlash, Nader.

We had this debate at the level of the Supreme Court in the USA already. Can't we let it die? Well, granted, if more scientific data were to come out in favour of one side or the other (with statistical significance), then we ought to be willing to change our minds and revisit the issue. THAT is what Obama is planning. It's not really justified from my standpoint because I haven't read any good links in psychology between virtual and real violence (that are causal). However, Obama's approach is scientific, not mere reactionary strikes against entertainment. Let's see how those turn out first.Last edited by Cabalavatar1 on 1/23/2013 12:15:44 AM

They spend money on useless endeavors for the simple reason that politicians are afraid to tackle the problem head-on.

And they won't do that, because they have to go through a particularly powerful lobby first.

The same lobby that recently blamed videogames for most violent crimes in the US.

And that's why they're just wasting time (and money). Trying to look busy to those that want them to take action. But nothing will get done. Because they're all afraid to take any meaningful action.

So that's why we keep having all these shootings.

We had the Columbine shooting and politicians did what they're doing now. Beating around the bush, avoiding the problem head-on. We had the Tucson shooting, and the same thing happened. The Aurora movie theater shooting went down and we had more of the same reactions.

There is a definite pattern there. And it would be easy to deal with this issue if people in power had the cojones to deal with it. But they don't and won't. And they'll keep trying to blame it all on videogames and movies.

When I was a kid in the 70s, I remember thinking how cool this guy was. He was like Mr. Wizard or Bill Nye the science guy. He was someone that was fighting for safe products on the market. How could a guy like that be all bad. Then he started running for President and he has gone all bonkers since.

Video games are sold in almost all first world countries around the globe and yet it is only the US that sees these horrific mass shootings almost every year. So clearly video games are not the problem.

Now I wonder, what's the difference between most of the modern world and the US? Oh ya that's right, most of the world has realized that civilians don't need friggin assault rifles with 100 round magazines and that owning a gun really isn't a human birthright.

For those of us outside of the USA it is quite clear what needs to be done to curb the violence and we really hope you guys figure it out before the next tragedy.

(Also I'd like to acknowledge that it is not everyone in the US who thinks that way and most likely not even the majority.)Last edited by matt99 on 1/23/2013 5:21:04 AM

So, controlling, regulating and overtaxing businesses and people's lives is okay, but name-calling is not? Some seriously twisted thinkers in this world. The Weather Underground predicted only about 10% of the population will understand and notice America's propoganda, and from seeing the flip-flopping of comments on this site I'm willing to bet they were right.

So, spend all this money to determine ultra violent games are bad for youth. Then what? I know! Lets put together a way to rate these games so we can let parents and retailers know which games should stay out of the hands of kids for their personal health.

Nader is an ass. Anyone who still has the decades old mindset that video games are for children is an ass, an ill-educated ass. Anyone that thinks that the industry makes M-rated or even the Teen rated games for young children is an ass.

What are the demographics of gaming now? Average age is 30-odd? Yeah, that's a whole lot of kids right there Mr Nader - you ass.

The problem here is that people want a scape goat, so they look around and see video games, violent video games. Well, video games are for kids right? No self respecting 60 thousand year old politician or lobbyist would be imature enough to play them, so clearly they are for the under-12 brigade. But they are so violent, OMG, they must be digitally molesting our child's minds with this graphic violence!

Except of course, like R-rated and X-rated movies on DVD/BluRay, they are not made for or sold to children, they are sold to grown ups. Whether those grown ups are particularly mature is not a subject for discussion since they are legally adults and able to buy such material. Once the DVD or BD is in the home it's up to the parent to make sure that under age people don't access it. Just as it's a parent's job to make sure that junior doesn't find daddy's .44 Magnum and blow away his best friend he just had a knock down drag out fight with after getting buzzed on something.

Calling out games over violence in M-rated and AO games and claiming that this is a threat to children is identical to calling out R-rated/X-rated movies and the porn industry. Except to do that would invoke the specter of censorship. Games are still not seen as a legitimate form of art or entertainment by the stone-age minds in the political world, they are an easy target.

The trouble is, it's the wrong target. If the reason for scapegoating games is shootings, tackle the availability of guns and ammunition; if it's violence among kids and young people, look to the parenting and education system; If it's societal decline, look to society in general; economic woes - try the banks; the point being, blaming video games for any of this is like blaming football spectators for the season ending injury suffered by a player during an awkward tackle on the field of play.

Nader is an ass, any politician or lobbyist that goes along with this crap is an ass. If they want to look at violence in the media in general and suggest that the level is too high, that's fine, I can see an argument for that. But let's not set up games as being the boogeyman that can do no right. That's non-sense, and the content of m-rated and AO games has nothing to do with children. The sooner that message get's through the better.

Violence is highly tolerated in the US entertainment media, more so that language, nudity or sex. The US is the most violent developed nation on Earth, we have the highest (by FAR) murder and gun death rates of any major developed nation. Are the two related? Draw your own conclusions, but please let's not invoke the old "protect the kids" crap like Nader is doing.

Absurd and ignorant argument. Has he actually ever played a video game? I would bet my life on it that if he has it was a violent game, or games and he's probably only seen a quick video anyway.

Not all violent games speak for the industry. Bet he's never seen Journey, or Flower. Bet he's never seen Unfinished Swan or Echocrome. How about LBP? And what about the games like a Journey, Flower, Heavy Rain that are trying to push the industry forward in positive directions? So as a game developer, I'm an Electronic child molester? That makes a lot of sense, considering that we game developers go out of our way to offend and we as an industry are responsible for violence in America.

Get this. There is violence all over the world. Do you think all the terrorists in the middle east spend their time playing video games, and that's why there are suicide bombers and the lot? No, it has to do with the individual and their environment. It's ultimately up to the individual to discriminate between violence and reality.

And if to use the Connecticut shooting as an example, that kid was so fu**ed up to begin with, it didn't matter. He was hurt on the inside and took it out on innocent children because HE WAS MESSED UP! Not because of video game violence, or movie or TV violence. His mom took him target shooting, think that may have played into it a bit more than a damn video game. The industry sells millions and millions of games each year to millions of people. If violent video games really effects people so much, every idiot (myself included) who has bought a COD game would be shooting people in real life. If it's so INFLUENTIAL, if it's so NEGATIVE, then 20 million people would become killers. If it really plays on people's psyches that much, then so many people would be engaging in real acts of violence. But they don't. And the people that do engage in shootings have mental disorders or are just fu**ed up, or they weren't given enough love as a child. Or it has to do with the environment they were raised in, it could be anything. External sources don't play into this as much as these politicians think. Politicians need to stop blaming video games, and art in general for these things. How about examining the perp's life and seeing how they're messed up psychologically, and why that is, and I guarantee that violent video games, movies, TV, books, whatever else has nothing to do with it.

Violence as a whole is down in America since 2002, and that was the beginning of the HALO/COD/FPS being really exposed to main stream America. So how about that? That's according to an FBI study by the way.

I don't go around talking about foreign policy because I don't know enough about that to make an educated statement about the topic. I would if I did, but I don't. And I don't want to make an idiot of myself, because I am ignorant in that respect. Take a hint Ralph Nader. You may have had something to do with the creation of the seat belt, but you are a narrow minded fool (as is anyone else) who thinks that violence in games, film or TV has a really dramatic effect on anyone to the point where it would push them to kill someone. The individuals who commit these atrocious acts are already unstable due to real life. And those people probably shouldn't play violent games, but to say violent games are directly responsible is absurd.

Violence has been around since the dawn of time. Violence is in the bible. Brutal, graphic violence. Hey, maybe those kids read the bible and thought that stoning someone for doing something wrong is a great idea. Better yet, let's bloody crucify them. *SARCASM* Let's outlaw the Bible. Maybe that'll turn America around! That has just as much weight as any violent game if you're going to use that argument. And I don't mean any of what I just said, I'm using it as an example over how incredibly stupid this argument is.

And as a developer, I take great offense to that statement. Walk a mile in my shoes, work 140 hours a week and then tell me if I'm really an electronic child molester when I'm trying to make games that tell great stories that touch and can inspire people one day. My goal isn't to make America a violent place, my goal is to enlighten my audience and take them on an emotional journey.

Also, politicians in other countries are trying to bring video game makers IN to their country....

Why do you suppose that is?

In my city, Digital Extremes is regularly touted by our city council and our chamber of commerce. Our provincial government is constantly providing tax benefits to game makers to bring the multi-billion industry close to home, if possible.

Nader should ask himself... why? Do video games provide a positive benefit to society and even our economy?

I would rather have assault rifles in my country and accessible to law-abiding citizens rather than not have them and have to worry about some psycho country like China or North Korea launching a pre-emptive attack that leaves me and my family defenseless, or if we the people need to overthrow a corrupt U.S. government that fails to observe the constituton it is tasked with upholding.

Just want to point out, that if you are invaded by another country, and your military can't stop them, you aren't very likely to be able to defend your family against an entire army, or missiles, or tanks, or etc etc etc.

I get what you're saying, but let's be realistic here... what you're describing is a very unrealistic scenario, and even if it were realistic, you are employing a very false sense of security. You've got a better argument saying you're protecting yourself from burglars.

Agree with many others, you simply don't dignify that kind of disgusting comment with a response.

I WILL say that we should all get used to a lot of outrageous, over-the-top comments from leading political figures on both sides of the aisle. Far right wingers like Rick Santorum and icons of the left like Bill Maher share a wholly unsubstantiated, unscientific loathing of violent video games. When someone doesn't listen to the facts, how can you reason with them?

Ralph Nader is a nothing more than a washed-up has-been hack that hasn't been relevant for a good 40+ years now.The only time Nader ever mattered was when he wrote the 1965 book "Unsafe at any speed" about car manufacturer's safety records, and especially the Chevrolet Corvair at that time.

Anyway, with that said.....

Everyone is finding it in Vogue these days to jump on either, the blame guns bandwagons, the blame video games bandwagons, or riding their wagon slip-shod at both.

But they "ARE NOT" out to better the world at all, they "ARE ONLY" out to take your rights away, even if they have to do it bit by bit & inch by inch as they are trying to do right now.

And that's exactly why they keep hiding the true facts and keep sweeping the real truths under their rugs, that it's the "MEDS", YES! the MEDS that almost every single one of these mass murderers were all under, each under some kind of prescribed mind-altering psychotropic drugs.

FYI: Just read what one of the UK's top psychiatrist's has to say about all these massacres.....

Top psychiatrist: Meds behind school massacres....

Society conducting 'vast social experiment' without knowing its end

NEW YORK – If lawmakers and authorities are truly concerned about stopping gun violence in schools, they need to take a close look at the prescription of psychotropic drugs for children and young people, says a leading psychiatrist.

In an exclusive in-person interview in New York City with WND, London-based Dr. David Healy criticized pharmaceutical companies that have made billions of dollars marketing Selective Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitors, known as SSRIs.

The drugs are widely used in the U.S. as antidepressants by doctors working in the mental health field and increasingly by primary care doctors, he noted.

Healey insisted the problem today is that doctors working with schools to control the behavior of children are inclined to prescribe SSRI drugs without serious consideration of adverse consequences.

“The pharmaceutical companies made these drugs with the idea of making money,” he said. “There’s a wide range of problems when it comes to looking at these drugs for children. Very few children have serious problems that warrant treatment with pills that have the risks SSRI drugs have.”

The drugs can make children “aggressive and hostile,” he noted.

“Children taking SSRI drugs are more likely to harm or to injure other children at school,” said Healy. “The child may be made suicidal.

“We are giving drugs to children who are passing through critical development stages, and as a society we are really conducting a vast experiment and no one really knows what the outcome of that will be.”

Healey cautioned that there is a very high correlation between mass shootings and use of the drugs.

“When roughly nine out of every 10 cases in these school shootings and mass shootings involve these drugs being prescribed, then at least a significant proportion of these cases were either caused by the drugs or the drugs made a significant contribution to the problem,” he said.

FYI: You can read the full article, along with names of those mind-altering drugs, right here at: